


Standing by the Maelstrom

by Mr_Crocodile



Series: On the shoulders of Titans [1]
Category: Godzilla - All Media Types
Genre: Fanart, Gen, Illustrations, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Suicide, it gets really dark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:20:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26559607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mr_Crocodile/pseuds/Mr_Crocodile
Summary: A great beast. a Kaiju, is sighted off the coast of Oregon...Authorities claim that there is no need to worry...
Series: On the shoulders of Titans [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1990825
Comments: 10
Kudos: 15





	Standing by the Maelstrom

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this short one-shot for two reasons:  
> a) Titanosaurus is way too underused. I _had_ to give my fishy boy the spotlight!  
> b) I really wanted to explore what a Kaiju attack looks and feels like from a more realistic/grounded perspective that I don't see used very often.

**25th of October, 1984** **  
** **Sounder’s Point,Oregon, United States of America**

He just stood there.

He had seen the news, of course he had, everyone had by that point, every news channel, newspaper and site had been running the story for weeks. 

_“Titanosaurus sighted 70 miles off of Newport.”_

They had played the low quality footage so many times that the grainy and shaky image of a reddish-orange blob in the middle of the sea so many times he had it ingrained on his head. 

If only it was the only image the thing would eventually ingrain on his mind. 

When the news played at the bar, he just stood there, he drank his beer and minded his business, no one at Sounder’s Point thought anything of it, the news were always fear mongering about this or that Kaiju, monstrosity or titan. But what for? Only the Navy really knew the relevant details and if the Navy or the G-Force wasn’t setting up shop in Oregon, then the thing wasn’t coming to Oregon.

And even if it did, his cousin Anthony had argued, why would it attack a fishing town in the middle of fuck all?

So, he just stood there, agreeing, having fun, getting drunk with his cousins and sisters.

That night, when he got back to the lighthouse and turned the TV on to watch the not-insane news, he instead got to see the breaking news footage of Titanosaurus tearing a cargo ship apart like plywood. And he stood there. Watching. His mother must have been watching it too, because she called to ask if it had been the one he had seen and commented on a few days before… 

“I’m not sure, could have been.” He answered.

Taylor wasn’t scared, he really wasn’t, the Navy said that the thing was heading west, and he believed them, not because of what they said, but because they weren’t sending ships in… But the image of the deck just _crumbling_ refused to leave him for the rest of the night.

The next few days were almost normal, ships came and went, his father invited him over to a barbecue he had to decline attending because he had repairs to do, he did promise that he’d for sure go to the one next week to celebrate his sister’s engagement. But only almost normal, he could feel it, the awkwardness, the slight fear, everyone had watched the clips, heard the sound of metal being twisted to its breaking point. A few people had asked him if he had seen anything, the question laced with fear, he said that of course he hadn’t, that he would have alerted everyone.

And after they left, he just stood there. With their unwelcome fears now intruding into his mind.

And then, three days later, it woke him up in the middle of the night.

The roars, distorted trumpeting sounds, louder than any ship horn or storm alarm, loud enough that he felt it in his bones.

And he ran, he ran to the very top of the lighthouse. Before him pitch darkness, a cloudy, moonless night being periodically pierced by his lantern, showing a foaming and turmoiled ocean, darker than the night. Behind him, the entirety of Sounder’s point, only lit by the streetlights, but he could see the houses come to life, woken by the horrific cries which had woken him up too.

But he turned around, and he stood there, frozen on the Widow’s Walk, grabbing the railing with so much strength that his knuckles turned white and the metal bit into his skin. 

And the beacon did another full turn, nothing, he just stood there, rain starting to fall, wetting the coat he had hastily grabbed and thrown over his shoulders.

And another pass of the light, and he just stood there, the rain picked up, ricocheting against the metal and making the stone-made lighthouse glisten.

And then it roared again, this time, without the thick walls of the lighthouse, it was so cruelly loud that it hurt him to listen, so he let go of the railing, covered his ears and cringed, and in the process, he slipped on the now wet metal floor and fell against the glass wall of the lantern room, cracking but not breaking it. He closed his eyes and felt blood trickle from his left ear into his closed hand. He couldn’t hear his own thoughts over the roars, he could feel them interrupting each other and repeating like a broken record.

When it stopped, he opened his eyes, just in time for the next pass of the beacon, and he saw it.

Emerging from the waters, the enormous sail-backed monster pushed water aside with its enormous mass, around 100 meters long the news had said, they were wrong, it was even larger. Large enough to hold a trawler on its jaws. A trawler, it had a trawler on its mouth and it was shaking it like a dog with a toy.

Anthony’s trawler, his cousin’s trawler. 

And on the beacon’s next turn, he watched it being crushed and devoured by the aquatic Kaiju. And he stood there.

On the next turn, Titanosaurus turned his long snout towards the light shining into his eyes, those horrible, glowing yellow eyes, they were staring at him, at his lighthouse, at him.

And then, in the span of a second, the beacon kept moving and he lost sight of it.

And he stood, and he ran.

He ran into the lantern room, crying and terrified like a child after a nightmare.

And he shut off the lantern, and he knelt beside it, and he bawled. And then the next roar came, so he crawled downstairs to the lower levels of the lighthouse as all the glass on the lantern room shattered and exploded in the same direction as that of the roars.

And once he got to the lowest level of the lighthouse, he ran to the central power switch and turned everything off with shaking hands, blood running the length of his jaw from both of his ears, the acute and penetrating pain refusing to let up.

And after that, he didn’t stand, he collapsed, his knees giving up, and on the floor he cried in fear, grabbing onto his face and screaming until his voice grew hoarse and raw. And all the while, he heard the beast march, march towards the shoreline, towards Sounder’s Point, with the lights and sounds of the city grabbing its interest more than the now silent and dark Lighthouse.

He listened to it roar and destroy and muder all night long.

The next day, when after hours of fearing that it would return for him he gathered the strength to stand up and exit the building, he saw with aid from the morning sun that his hometown had been torn asunder, he ran towards his family and friends, their homes and businesses. And he only found death and somber first responders.

The following day, representatives from the army interviewed him to try to figure out how the Kaiju had gotten through their detection systems. “You are one of the few dozens of witnesses we have found”, they said. “Your insight will be invaluable and helpful,” they tried to comfort him. But when not even their psychologist managed to calm him down enough to give a clear retelling, they left, telling him they would come back a few days later to speak with him again.

They didn’t have the chance to.

The next morning he walked to the edge of the lighthouse’s pier. 

He just stood there that night, he had done nothing, he stood there as those he thought himself protector of were murdered while he stood frozen in fear.

So, he stopped just standing there.

And he jumped off.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, comments and feedback are very welcome!  
> And feel free to tell me if there are any other Kaijus you'd like for me to give the spotlight!  
> And also, an enormous thank you and hug to Celticblair for the awesome fanart! Love you Sis!


End file.
